


Not Less Than Everything

by orphan_account



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Bottom!Harry, Drama, Drug Use, Established Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, Hurt/Comfort, Jaded!Harry, M/M, Romance, Self-Harm, UST, auror!Harry, top!draco
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-08
Updated: 2013-08-01
Packaged: 2017-11-13 19:21:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 20,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/506845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When his owl flies through my window, I know without looking at the parchment what it is the bastard wants.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N:  
>  Dear Readers, **
> 
> **After struggling with this fic for many months, I am, unfortunately, throwing in the towel. I hate to do this, and I’m really quite sorry, but this fic will never be completed. This was my first WIP and I was quite ambitious with it. I swore I wasn't going to be one of those people who can’t finish, but the truth is, I’ve lost interest in this fic, and because of that I can’t see a resolution.**
> 
> **[But, In Dreams](http://archiveofourown.org/works/846553) is what this fic would have been if I had written it better. It has many of the same themes, and I hope you give it a read, even though I’ve disappointed you with this one. **
> 
> **I’m never endeavouring on a WIP again. All my works, ficlets and long stories will be completed before posting from now on, so I can actually promise that this will not happen again.**
> 
> **If you have,  
>  thanks for sticking with me this long.   
> I’m still writing  
> Love,   
> Nox**
> 
> ****

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. 

 

When his owl flies through my window, I know without looking at the parchment what it is the bastard wants. As usual, his prose is very brief. 

_Come over._

I Floo Pansy and apologise for cancelling on her so late. From the look on her face I know she knows where I’m going. 

‘Draco, you said you would stop this.’

I did. I remember that. I remember lying on Pansy and Millie’s couch, my head in her lap, making promises I knew I’d never keep. 

I shrug. ‘I changed my mind.’

Her pursed lips are the last thing I see before I close the Floo and contemplate what to wear. 

I know it won’t matter. I know what this is. Potter’s had a bad day at work or a fight with Granger or Weasley or his ex-girlfriend. He’s drunk and he’s horny, and he knows I’ll come. I know he fucks around. I know I’m not the only one. I don’t care. I know I’ll go, just as Potter knows he never really has to ask. That’s the way it is with us. The way it’s been for the last three years. 

I drop out of his Floo and land in the empty living room of his flat. It’s is even more of a mess than usual. There’s a stack of papers and red file jackets on the coffee table. His Auror robes are thrown across the couch and his broom and Quidditch gear are tossed in a heap in a corner. 

I scratch the back of my neck and call his name. It’s unusual for him not be waiting for me on the sofa when I arrive.

There’s a bit of noise form the kitchen. ‘In here,’ he yells. 

I drop my robes next to his and walk through the narrow hallway to his kitchen. He’s sitting shirtless on a stool next to the small table in his breakfast nook, with a glass of Firewhisky and an empty bottle. He doesn’t look up when I walk in. 

‘Hey,’ I say.

He knocks back the last of his drink and wipes his palms on his loose flannel sweatpants. 

‘It’s just like you to drink all for yourself,’ I say. ‘Prat.’

A ghost of a smile flickers on his face. ‘If I knew you wanted, I’d have asked you to come sooner.’ 

I smile, walk around behind him and place my hands on his shoulders. 

‘You look tense,’ I tell him, smoothing my hands across the smooth planes of his back and massaging his neck. He groans under my touch and his head falls forward, almost to the table. 

‘Rough day,’ he says.

‘Do you want to talk about it?’

He groans again. ‘No,’ he says.

It’s the answer I expect. 

He never wants to talk about his work with the Aurors. I know he’d rather be on a Quidditch pitch playing for the league. He’s been offered at least four contracts that I know of, but the idiot doesn’t want to leave Weasley to find a new partner, or let anyone else down. Everyone expects him to be Harry-bloody-Potter, and so, he does it. The last time I tried to talk to him out of it, I had a black eye and a bruise on my chest for a week. I’m not about to bring it up again anytime soon. 

I drape my arms across his shoulders and he holds my palm in his hands for a moment. His skin is warm. It’s all I can do not to press my lips at the nape of his neck and pull him into my arms. But the bastard doesn’t do hugs, or dates or anything more than a Floo call every once in a while for a quick fuck and a drink. 

He presses his lips on the inside of my palm and I immediately stand very still. It’s not like him to do something so --intimate. His back is tense and I know something must have happened today. Something I’m going to see in the _Prophet_ tomorrow. Something that’s upset him enough to make him unguarded and unsettled.

I’ll have to ask Granger about it in the morning. 

He gently lets my hand drop and I step back when he stands up to toss the empty bottle in a bucket next to the fridge. I watch him as he slowly turns to me, crossing his arms across his chest and trying his best to keep his face carefully blank. But his eyes are too bright, so I know something’s wrong. Of a sudden, he walks over to me a kisses me on the mouth, pushing us backward until he’s pressing me into the wall. He shoves his fingers into my hair and grips my head tight. I open my mouth beneath him and he swipes his tongue over my own. He tastes like whiskey. I can’t help it. I groan his name into his mouth and arch into his lean frame. 

He pulls away and rests his forehead against my chest. 

‘Fuck me, will you?’ he says breathlessly.

I want to. _So much._ And I know I shouldn’t, but I always do. I always come back. 

‘All right.’ 

He steps back and looks and me, just looks at me with those fucking green eyes, and I want to tell him to quit ―just say fuck you to the Corps, because I know it’s completely fucking him up, and he hates it and all he wants is to play sodding Quidditch in the league and make charity calendars with his team and sign autographs for 11-year-old boys with wide eyes and glasses just like his. And if he would just _talk_ to me we could work something out where we didn’t have to be passing fucks anymore, and it’s okay for him to be scared or hurt or ashamed. But I don’t say any of these things. Instead, I take his hand and lead him to his room like I always do. 

He follows me with his head bowed, and I take him to his oak bed and let him sit on the edge. I take off his glasses and rest them on his side table. He looks at me for a moment, and then he does it again: he takes my palm and kisses me on the inside of my wrist. My heart shudders. _This_ is why I told Pansy I couldn’t do this anymore. I remember now. 

I kneel in front of him. He leans forward and kisses me again slowly, his legs on either side of my body. His lips are soft. He’s an amazing kisser, better even than Theo, who we’ve both fucked at one time or another. He pulls away and tugs at my shirt and we both pull it up over my head. My hair falls around my face and after he tosses the shirt on the floor, he pushes the soft strands off my forehead with his fingers. I tug at the waistband on his hips and he helps me pull his sweats off. He isn’t wearing pants and his prick is half hard already. 

I stand quickly and shuck the rest of my clothes and he watches me with heavy lidded eyes. 

I know he wants me. I’ve never doubted that. He likes my body. I know he doesn’t let anyone else fuck him the way I do. It’s what keeps me coming back. Hoping, I suppose, that it means something. I’m the only one who’s ever been inside him. He’s the only one who’s ever been inside me. 

When did I become so pathetic?

I think, perhaps, it was after the first time he came inside me. I’m a complete and utter idiot, believe me, I know.

I kneel in front of him again and without any warning, I take his cock into my mouth. He gasps and grips my shoulder. I let his cock slide as far down my throat as I can manage. It’s thick and hot. It twitches in my mouth. I suck the head, pushing back the foreskin with my lips and sucking in my cheeks. 

He rests his hand softly on the back of my head and arches his body backwards. I hold the base of his cock in my hands and jerk him off slowly while I tease the head with my lips. 

_‘Draco.’_

I love it when he says my name like that. 

I let his cock pop out of my mouth and look up at him.

‘In me,’ he says. ‘Now.’ 

I nod and stand up quickly. My knees crack. 

‘Where’s the lube?’ 

He pushes himself up on the bed and pulls an almost empty tube of lube out from under his pillow. Easy access, I suppose. I wonder how many other people he’s fucked this month. How many other heads he’s messing with. 

I crawl up on the bed and watch and he dabs a dollop of lube into his hole and fucks himself on his fingers. My cock is dripping now; I can’t help but pull on it a few times, watching him prepare himself for me. He lies back on the bed. 

‘I’m ready,’ he says. 

I position myself over him and slide a finger inside him to be sure. He arches up off the bed.

‘Oh God,’ 

I spread some lube over my cock and start pressing into him. He’s tight. He always is. I don’t know how he does it. He lifts his leg over my shoulders and I lean into him more, bracing my palms on the bed, just above his shoulders. He puts his hands on either side of my face. I press into him further and try hard to stop myself from losing control too quickly. 

‘Fuck me, Draco. Please.’ 

I start moving in slow even strokes, and when he says _Harder, you bastard_ I thrust faster and faster and the bed head slams into the wall again and again. He snakes his hands between us and stokes himself, and when his body clenches around me it takes all in me not to come the same time he does. He groans as his own thick white spunk splatters across his stomach. 

I lean in and kiss him and he surprises me by pulling me close and digging his nails into my back. I thrust in and out of him a few more times, and when I feel my balls start to tighten I close my eyes.

‘Oh God.’ 

He threads his fingers into my hair and says: ‘Look at me.’ 

I open my eyes and come inside him, and he kisses me and it’s the best I’ve felt in months and _this_ ─ this is why I keep coming back. He fucks me like he loves me. Every time. 

I collapse on top of him and start to slide out, but he grabs my arm.

‘Not yet,’ he says. 

I turn on my side and he lies next to me, one leg wrapped around my hip, with my now softening cock still inside him. He brushes a few sweaty strands of hair off my forehead. 

‘Stay with me,’ he says.

I’ve never stayed the night before and I don’t think for a minute before I say _Yes._

He nods and closes his eyes. I slide out of him carefully and he drapes his arm across my chest. He’s falling asleep already. He must be fucking exhausted. He never sleeps. I kiss his forehead and pull him closer. I stay awake for as long as I can. 

I take what I can get.


	2. Chapter 2

When I wake up the bed is empty. I take a minute to breathe and then I look for my trousers. They’re tossed in a heap on the floor. Wrinkled. I pull them on and look around for my shirt. I can’t find it. I open his top drawer where I know he keeps his. The black one ─my favourite with the gold phoenix in the front─ is folded neatly on top a hazardous pile of twisted socks, shirts and ties. 

What a fucking slob. 

I pull on his T-shirt and grab my shoes. 

He’s in the kitchen, fully dressed in his Auror robes, sipping a cup of hot coffee and reading the _Prophet_ with a frown between his brows. 

I watch him from the door way and fold my arms across my chest.

‘Morning,’ I say.

‘Hey,’ he says without looking up.

‘Is there any coffee left?’ 

He absently runs a finger across the rim of his cup and nods. When he looks up at me, he raises his brows in a silent question. 

‘Couldn’t find mine,’ I say. 

‘Oh.’ 

‘I’ll bring it back, Potter.’ 

‘No it’s fine. I just─’ 

‘What?’ 

He smiles slowly. ‘It looks good on you,’ he says.

My mouth twitches, and he looks back down at his papers, as though firmly engrossed. 

I walk over to the coffee pot and open his cabinets. There’s a chipped Chudley Cannons mug next to tea cup with Weasley and Granger’s wedding photo. 

‘You have three coffee cups,’ I say. I pick the Cannons mug and fill it hallway. 

‘I live alone’ he says.

I make a small noise in my throat and look at him. His eyes dart away from me. I’d only heard that Wood moved out last month, but it’s nice to know for certain.

‘Anyway,’ he says standing. ‘I have to go in. Clean up the mess I made last night.’ 

‘All right.’ 

I lean back into the countertop, ignoring the sharp stab of the wood in my back and rest my cup in the sink behind me. He leans over me to pour the rest of his coffee down the drain and I don’t step aside.

I’m tired of stepping aside. 

He looks at me for a moment, and then he leans in and kisses me softly. He’s shorter than me. I’ve always loved that. Always loved than I can lean down into him and have him fit in the space beneath my chin. When he pulls away I reach out to touch him, but he steps back. 

‘Don’t believe anything you read in the _Prophet_ today,’ he says softly.

‘I never do,’ I tell him. 

He nods. I reach for his hand and he lets me take it. I kiss his palm the way he kissed mine. We stand for a moment, just looking at each other.

‘I have to go,’ he says. I let his hand drop. He straightens his robes and checks his sleeve for his wand. 

‘You can stay as long as you want,’ he says. ‘Just─’

‘Don’t be here when you get back. I know the deal.’ 

‘Draco─’ 

‘It’s all right. I won’t be here.’ 

He looks at me for a moment again, and then Disapparates with a pop.


	3. Chapter 3

I leave his flat after lunch to change at home. I have some errands in London, a few potions ingredients to order and the Healer in charge of a hospital in Serbia wants to meet with me to discuss wholesale prices. When I get home, the _Evening Prophet_ is in my Floo. On the cover of is a picture of Harry in his robes, stepping out of the Ministry and scowling deeply at the reporters flashing cameras in his face. 

Underneath it reads: _Muggles found dead in Ipswich with their Muggle-born son. Famed Auror Harry Potter accused of negligence._

I Floo Granger. Her face is tight and grim when she answers. 

‘What the fuck is this?’ I ask, showing her the cover. 

She presses her lips together and steps back. 

‘You better come through.’ 

I drop the _Prophet_ on the floor, check my pocket for my wand before I step through the flames and into Granger’s flat. Or Granger-Weasley, as she prefers to be called. She’s pregnant again; almost ready to pop it seems with her second (and last, or so she insists to me) child. She’s on leave now, but we work together, Granger and I. Lucius still can’t believe it, but we’ve managed to keep our potions research lab open because of three new potion variations we put forth together last year alone. Granger herself was on the last cover of _Potions Today_ and there’s talk about her winning the Academy’s _Potioneer of the Year_ award. If she does, she’ll be the youngest in three centuries. 

We’re now the number one supplier for St. Mungo’s and St. Breyer’s, the hospital on the continent, with three or so others clamouring to be added to the list. I want desperately to sign them all, but Boot, our financial rep at Gringotts says we should wait. I hate to admit it, but the prat is right. The market’s not in our favour.

Granger and I fight almost every day; especially when she wants to hire some young chit fresh out of Hogwarts, twice as eager as she was, and I want to hire someone older, more refined, like Severus. Or when some tosser insists he can’t work with a former Death Eater and I’m ready to give it up, but she insists I must _‘Stand up for yourself for goodness sake!’_ But I suppose we’ve developed a friendship of sorts. She knows about Harry and me. So does her husband, although he likes to pretend otherwise for his sister’s sake.

‘What’s going on?’ I ask. 

She presses her hand to the hollow of her spine. ‘It’s a fucking mess,’ she says. 

It has to be pretty bad, I’ve barely heard her use any word more profane than ‘blast’ except when she’s in the potions lab. She takes my hand and we walk over to the couch and I help her sit. She props he legs up on the ottoman in front of her, sits and then pats the empty space next to her indicating that I should join her. 

‘They had a tip that those Muggles were targets. It fell through. They didn’t get there it time,’ she says. ‘Harry was there ─they killed that little boy right in front of him’ 

‘Shit,’ I say. ‘That explains a lot.’ 

She frowns. ‘What do you mean?’ 

‘I was with him last night. He was –different’ 

‘Did you two─?’

I give her a look and she sighs.

‘Ron thinks he might be suspended,’ she says.

‘Harry? Why?’ 

‘The tip was from one of Harry’s sources they’ve been using for intel on that Neo-Purist group. An inmate in Azkaban. When Harry didn’t catch the Purists in time, he got upset. He went back to the Ministry and asked for time alone with his source.’

She glances over at me and tucks a stand of hair behind her ears.

‘Just tell me, Granger.’ 

She sighs and drops her hands onto her stomach. 

‘He used an Unforgivable, Draco. The Cruciatus,’ she doesn’t look up at me. ‘They’re going to suspend him for excessive force.’ 

‘Fuck.’ 

I lean back in the couch and rub my hands over my face.

‘I’m worried about him,’ I tell her without moving my hands.

Hermione sighs. ‘Me too.’ 

‘You know he hates his job,’ I tell her.

‘I never thought he should be an Auror.’ 

I lift my head up and look at her, ‘Then why the fuck don’t you say something?’ 

‘You think I haven’t? You know what he’s like. He doesn’t even let me get a word in and Ron- I love them both, but they absolutely refuse to talk about anything that might make them uncomfortable. And Harry will never admit he wants to leave. They’re partners. Best friends. It’s difficult for him.’ 

‘It’s killing him.’ 

‘ _I know_ , Draco. I know,’ she says, she rubs her hand over her stomach and winces. 

‘What is it?’ I ask, reaching for her. She grabs my hand and places it on her stomach. 

‘The baby’s kicking,’ she says, smiling. Then she frowns, ‘Ouch! It’s like it’s trying to claw its way out my stomach.’ 

I hastily grab my hand back. She laughs and then she takes my hand again. ‘Draco, I know you care about him. But─’

‘I know.’

She rubs her thumb over the back of my hand. 

‘Do you? I love Harry, and I love you too, Draco, believe it or not. But I don’t think he’s ready for what you want right now.’ 

I raise an eyebrow. ‘And you know what I want?’ 

She smiles. ‘It’s pretty obvious, Malfoy.’ 

I sigh. It’s no use trying to save face with Granger. She’d see right through it.

‘Is he still fucking Wood?’ I ask.

‘Draco─’

‘Is he?’

‘I don’t know. He could be. Honestly I don’t keep track anymore.’ 

I drop my head back against the sofa. ‘Thanks.’

‘I’m just trying to tell you the truth. I think you two would be lovely together. I do! But I don’t want to see you hurt.’

I start to stand up. This conversation is too much for me tonight. I need Pansy and Millie, and their plush leather sofa and a glass of wine and their constant reminders that Potter’s a jerk and I could do so much better. 

‘Wait. Draco, don’t leave. I don’t want you to leave upset.’ 

‘I’m not upset.’ 

‘Good then. How about a foot massage?’ 

‘Granger─’

‘Come on! I’m seven bloody months pregnant!’

‘Cow.’

‘Wanker.’

I sit down and she drops her feet in my lap. I’m appalled. They look swollen and red, and if it were anyone else, I’d toss them off me in an instant. I start on her left foot and roll my eyes when she groans and drops her head back onto the cushions


	4. Chapter 4

It’s a few weeks before I hear from Harry again. I’m having drinks with Blaise, Greg and Terry in _The Wiz_ when Pansy drops down onto the seat next to me. 

‘I thought you said you weren’t coming?’ I ask, moving around to give her room. 

I glance at Blaise and he looks away. It’s been a year since they broke off their engagement and she moved in with Millie, but he still watches her the way I find myself sometimes looking at Harry. 

‘I stopped by your place. This was in your Floo.’ 

She hands me an envelope. It’s the stationary I gave him when the idiot plebe told me he didn’t have any of his own. 

It says what it always says: _Come over._

I look up. Pansy’s looking at me with her eyebrows raised. 

‘I supposed you’d want it,’ she says.

I kiss her on the cheek. ‘Thank you, love.’ 

I swallow the rest of my stout, make my goodbyes and check my watch outside the pub. It’s half past one in the morning. 

I Apparate to an alley not too far from his flat, and then walk the last few metres to his building. The lights are off. I use his brass knocker, a Gryffindor lion (the prat) and wait. It’s cold. I push my fingers deep into my pocket and haunch over. After a few minutes he still doesn’t come out, so I knock again and then I hear his shuffling inside and smile. 

He opens the door wearing an unbuttoned white shirt and his jeans, his worn blue jeans, are slung low on his hips. My breath catches. He’s gorgeous. I’ll never get used to it. His hair is mussed and his lips are red and full. He leans on the doorframe and smiles a slow smile. The draft doesn’t seem to bother him. 

‘Draco Malfoy,’ he says slowly. 

‘That’s me.’

He doesn’t step aside. 

‘Draco Malfoy,’ he says again, softly.

I frown. ‘What’s going on?’ 

‘I thought you weren’t coming,’ he says. 

I raise an eyebrow, ‘Are you going to let me in?’ 

He looks at me for a moment, and then he sighs and steps aside. 

‘I wasn’t expecting you,’ he says slowly, as if measuring each word. 

He closes the door behind him and follows me into the living room.

‘Well I’m here,’ I say. ‘You called.’ 

‘I did,’ he says.

He scratches at the back of his neck, and then I notice the scratch marks along the side of his torso. 

My heart drops as I realise what’s going on. I am such an idiot.

I pull his shirt aside and poke him hard in the chest, pushing him back for a few steps. He stumbles a bit and throws his arm out to catch himself.

‘You couldn’t find your regular fuck buddy, so called in a back-up?’ I ask.

‘Calm down, Draco.’ 

He sways a bit, bracing himself on the edge of his sofa to help him gain his balance. 

Something’s not right. I move closer to him and hold his face in my palms, studying his eyes. His pupils a blown so wide I can barely see any green in his eyes anymore. I drop my hands and step back a few paces. 

‘Harry, what are you on?’ 

‘Nothing,’ he says, closing the gap between us and presing himself into me, wrapping his arms around my waist. ‘It’s nothing.’ 

He fits right under my chin. He’s my best friend, and I’ve never seen him like this. I’ve never not known how to help him. But I have no idea what to do now. I’ve never dealt with this.

‘You smell good,’ he says, nudging his head beneath my chin. 

‘Do I?’ 

I lead him to the sofa and when he drops back into the cushions, I kneel in front of him.

‘Harry, what did you take?’

‘I’m fine,’ he says. He leans back against the sofa and pulls his legs into his chest, closing his eyes. ‘It’s nothing.’ 

There’s a shuffling noise in his room, and the sound of ripping paper. I don’t want to go in there. I don’t want to see the person he’s replaced me with tonight. 

‘Stay there,’ I tell him, and then I go in anyway. 

He looks like me; that’s the first thing I notice. He’s a Muggle, I’m sure of it. Not old enough to be out of Hogwarts, and he’s sniffing white powder up his nose with his eyes closed. He looks up when I open the door. 

I flip on the light switch.

‘Get your things,’ I say. ‘You’re leaving.’

‘Who the fuck are you?’ 

I grab his arm and lift him up off the bed. ‘I said, get out.’ 

‘What the fuck, all right!’

He clears away his stash and pulls on his clothes. I walk behind him out of the bedroom and into the living room, where Harry still has his eyes closed, sitting on the sofa. I push the boy forward so he’ll keep walking towards the doorway. Just before he reaches it though, I press my palm flat against his chest and push him hard against the wall. 

‘What did you give him?’ I ask 

‘Nothing. He’s on something I’ve never seen.’ 

_Jesus._ It must be a potion. 

I look sharply at the boy, ‘Did you take any?’ 

‘No,’ the kid rubs his nose, ‘He just picked me up outside some club. He looked good for it.’ 

I breathe slowly out through my nose. When Harry sobers up; I’m going to _kill_ him. 

‘All right,’ I say. ‘Go home.’ 

‘What about my money?’ 

‘Get the fuck out of here before I call your fucking parents, you little twat.’ 

The boy scrambles out the door. 

‘Yes sir.’ 

I watch as he pulls the hood of his sweater over his head, walks down the street and turns into an alley. I spare a small thought for his safety and then I hear a loud thump behind me. 

‘Harry?’ 

I rush into the living room looking for his passed out body, but he’s fine, he’s just taken off his trainers and thrown them across the room. 

‘I’m fine, Draco.’ 

I sit next to him. 

‘I know how this looks,’ he says, in that same slow way that’s so unlike him

‘Do you, Harry? You’re an Auror for Merlin’s sake. And that boy was barely eighteen. And potions? Do you know how dangerous that shit is?’

‘I know.’ 

‘Harry─’

‘I’m fine. I just took something that didn’t agree with me. It won’t happen again.’ 

I rub my face harshly with my palms. I’m still wearing my jacket. I lean forward and pull it off and drape it on the arm of his sofa.

‘We’re did you get it?’ 

He hesitates. ‘I bought it.’ 

‘Tell me another,’ I say. 

‘Look, Draco, it doesn’t matter. I’m just sorry you─. Oh God,’ he rubs his face harshly with both his palms, ‘God I can’t think.’

‘That’ll be the Mallowsweet fucking with your nervous system, you twat. Not to mention the fucking Belladonna, that could poison you in an instant. Harry, do you realise that the slightest mistake in any one of these potions could kill you, apart from the fact that it’s completely illegal. You’re such a fucking idiot. I can’t even─’

‘I know.’

‘Do, you, you stupid prick? Cause you never seem to think about anyone─’

He takes my hand. ‘Draco, I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.’

I pull my hand away, run my fingers through my hair and then I drop my head back onto the cushions behind my head. 

‘I wasn’t kidding you know’ he says. 

‘What?’

‘You smell amazing.’ 

‘Oh,’ I shift awkwardly. ‘Thanks.’ 

He looks at me. ‘Really fucking amazing,’ he says, and then he kisses me. 

He tastes like cigarettes. I try not to think about what it means that he’s smoking again. 

Then I want to smack myself. I just found the prat with a teenaged boy in his room, he’s taking illegal potions, and I’m worried about his smoking. 

I lean back, trying to break the kiss but he only moves forward and climbs into my lap. He knows I love it when he does that. I can’t ever think straight with him on top of me. 

I pull away. ‘Why do you always do that? Why can’t you just _talk_ to me?’ 

‘I don’t want to talk,’ he murmurs, leaning forward. ‘I want to fuck.’ 

My cock is aching in my pants, and I can tell he’s hard already. 

‘Harry─’

‘Don’t you want to fuck me?’ he says, reaching between us and closing his hand around my cock. I gasp and squirm beneath him. He leans forward, nips my ear and kisses the side of my neck. ‘Don’t you want to put your cock in my hot, tight arse, Draco?’

He shifts his hips against my cock and I’m lost. 

‘Yes,’ I manage. 

He stands quickly and stumbles. When he catches himself he strips off his clothes, and I watch him avidly. His Auror training hasn’t put pounds of muscle on his frame, thank Merlin, but he’s still lean, with a flat chest and a trail of dark hair that leads straight to his cock that I particularly enjoy.

‘Get naked,’ he says, stroking his cock, and I can’t move fast enough. When all my clothes are finally off and strewn somewhere about, he straddles me again and takes my mouth in his.

When he says my name into my mouth and I groan and arch up into him. He leans back and runs his fingers through my hair. Our cocks are pressed against each other and he starts rocking his hips creating a slow slip-slide rhythm between us.

‘You don’t know how much I want you,’ he says. 

‘I think I might have some idea,’ I tell him.

He stops rocking his hips and holds my face between his palms. He swipes his thumb across my bottom lip following the trail of his finger with his eyes, and I grip his hips. 

His eyes meet mine.

‘You are so perfect,’ he says softly. ‘I know you don’t think that, but I do. I─’ 

He looks away. 

‘What? Harry? Just tell me.’ 

I don’t what it is I want him to say. 

I know exactly what it is I need him to say.

He leans forward and kisses me again and reaches behind me, digging into the sofa cushions.

He leans back. ‘Lift your arse a bit,’ he says. ‘You’re sitting on the lube.’

My stomach drops, and I remember that someone else has already been in my place tonight.

‘Did you fuck him, Harry?’ 

He grabs the lube from beneath me and squeezes some onto his fingers. His shoulders press into mine as he leans forward and works his fingers into his hole from behind. 

‘Harry?’ I say, digging my fingers into his hips. He gasps. ‘Did you fuck that kid?

‘Hush now,’ He kisses me and then guides my hand to his hole.

‘Did you fuck him, Harry?’ 

I don’t know why this hurts. I know who he is. I don’t know why I care at all. I shouldn’t care anymore.

‘Shhh,’ he says. ‘Just fuck me, Draco. Please.’

Yes. Because that’s what this is about. This is about fucking. I need to remember that. This is about fucking.

I slide one lube slicked finger into him and he groans. I feel it in deep in my chest. 

‘No one else fucks you like this, do they?’ I ask, twisting into him.

‘Ah─ God. No. No one, Draco,’ he says. 

I slip another finger into him, twisting my wrist.

‘Only me,’ I say. 

‘Only you. Oh fuck, Draco, please.’ 

I fuck him slowly with my fingers, making sure to twist upward ever so to brush his prostate. When he’s shaking in my arms, I move my fingers and position my cock at his entrance, he leans back and I enter him in one quick stroke. 

He groans and wraps his arms around my neck. I start to move but he presses down on my thighs. 

He looks me in the eyes for a moment, his eyes wide. I brush his hair of his face. He’s flushed and panting, and oh so fucking beautiful I almost can’t stand it. 

‘Don’t move,’ he says.

‘I have to. It’s too much.’

‘Not yet. Not yet,’ he says, his eyelids fluttering closed. ‘I want to remember this.’

I calm myself by rubbing my hands up and down his sides, and then finally he starts to ride my cock. Slow enough so that he’s driving me absolutely insane with each stroke. 

‘Harry, faster please I─’

I close my eyes because it’s too much. It’s too much of him inside of me, me inside him. 

‘Open your eyes, baby,’ he says. And I do. 

And then he kisses me while he’s riding me so slow and it’s too much. I come inside him harder, I think, than I’d ever come inside anyone. He keeps moving while I spiral down and when it’s over he leans against me and with a few quick strokes he comes all over my stomach. 

And then he’s kissing me and grasping onto my shoulders like a drowning man. I rub my palm in slow circles at the base of his spine. 

‘It’s all right,’ I tell him. 

I say it again and again, hoping eventually he’ll believe me.


	5. Chapter Five

These characters are not mine. They belong to J.K Rowling. I just play with them for fun.

* 

It’s just about dawn when I wake up, and he’s sitting next to me on the sofa with a steaming mug of _something_ in his hands.

When he sees I’m awake he lifts the cup. ‘Thank you for inventing this,’ he says. 

It must be our newest hangover potion.

I rub my eyes. ‘That would be Hermione,’ I say.

He grunts into his cup and I sit up. We’re both still completely starkers. 

‘What time is it?’ 

‘After six, maybe.’ 

‘Why are you awake?’

‘I didn’t sleep.’

I look around for my clothes and start putting them on. He just watches me from behind his mug. 

I sit next to him to put on my loafers and he puts his hand on my forearm. His fingertips are cold.

‘Last night got a little fucked up,’ he says. ‘I’m sorry.’ 

I nod. ‘What happened?’ 

He pulls his hand away and leans back into the sofa cushions. 

‘Nothing. I tried something I didn’t like. That’s it.’

I pull on my shoes. ‘And you made a complete tit of yourself in the process. Tell me you don’t plan on doing that again.’ 

‘No,’ he says softly. 

I sigh. ‘Harry, it’s dangerous,’ I say. ‘You’re an Auror. It can really cock things up for you.’ 

‘I know. I’ve already gotten it from Hermione.’

‘When?’

‘About half an hour ago. Where do you think I got this from?’ he asks, gesturing to the mug in his hands. 

It’s the same Cannons mug I’d used the first time I slept here.

We stare at each other for a minute. His gaze drops to my lips and then he looks away. 

He stands. ‘I think you should go, Draco,’ he says. 

‘Yeah.’

‘Floo powder is─’

‘I know where it is.’

I grab my coat from the couch 

‘I’ll owl you,’ he says. 

I pull my coat on.

‘I don’t know, Harry,’ I say. ‘Maybe you shouldn’t.’

I regret the words almost as soon as I say them, but he nods as though he’s been expecting it. 

‘All right,’ he says. ‘I won’t.’

I don’t say anything else. I grab a pinch of his Floo powder and leave.

*  


Hermione has a boy. She names him Hugo. I haven’t the slightest idea why. A few days after he’s born, she asks me to be godfather. I don’t know how she got Weasley to agree to it, but I’m pleased when he does. When I visit her and the baby in the hospital, Harry doesn’t even look at me.

He’s seeing Wood again, according to the _Prophet._ This time they’re making a show of it. Going to Wood’s matches together and being seen around the Ministry snogging. Holding hands. He fucking hates holding hands.

He’s off suspension and back in the Corps. I honestly didn’t expect it to last long. The papers have been clamouring for their brightest and bravest to protect them again. Shaklebolt reinstated him without the Head Aurors’ permission. Now they say he’s close to cracking the case of the Neo–Purists. The circle under his eyes, though, they tell me something different.

He’s still fucking Nott on the side, if Pansy’s right; and I’m sure she is. He’s up to all his old tricks. All except me.


	6. Chapter Six

*  
Hugo is five weeks old when it happens. Pansy catches me on the Floo. 

‘It’s Potter,’ she says. 

My heart stammers a hard tattoo against my chest and I scramble over to the hearth. 

‘What’s happened?’ 

‘There’s been some sort of attack on his team. He and Weasley are both in St Mungo's. There’s no word from anyone,’ she sighs. ‘Draco, I wish I knew more.’ 

I close the Floo before she can say anything else. I know she’ll understand.

I move as quickly as I can, and then Apparate to my potions lab which has direct Floo access into the Auror intake section of St. Mungo’s Spell Damage ward. I find Hermione sitting in one of the garish bottle-green armchairs with the Ginevra by her side. When Weasley sees me, she purses her lips but doesn’t say anything. Hermione jumps up and walks straight into my open arms. 

‘What happened?’ I ask.

'It was an ambush. A raid gone wrong─ I don’t really know. They won’t say,’ Hermione says.

‘Harry?’

‘He’s alive. He’s fine. He’s with Ron.’

I don’t try to hide my relief. I feel it in my toes. Weasley gives me a pointed stare and then I look back at Hermione. Her eyes are welling up with tears. 

‘Oh, fuck. Hermione, I’m so sorry. How is he?’ 

Her face crumples like paper and I pull her close. 

‘They don’t know,’ she says. ‘I mean. They won’t tell me anything. I brought what I could from the lab. They’re telling me they don’t want to use anything experimental. Draco. I─’

‘It’s all right,’ I tell her. I hold her close and smooth down her hair. Weasley rubs her back. She looks at me.

‘Everyone else is in the waiting room. They wouldn’t let any of us through,’ she says. 

‘What? That’s ridiculous.’

She scoffs, ‘Since when does the Auror department care about people’s families? I had to beg them to let me in with Hermione.’ 

‘Bastards.’ 

She raises her eyebrows, but thankfully she keeps her mouth shut.

‘Where’s Rose and Hugo?’ I ask Hermione. 

She sniffs, pressing her check against my chest, ‘With Molly and Arthur in the waiting room,’ she says. 

Harry comes through one of the dark oak double doors, his robes covered in blood and Merlin knows what else. His eyes are wild. Ginevra walks over to him and he gives her a one-armed hug. He glances at me and then Hermione.

‘He’ll be all right,’ he says tiredly. ‘They’ve got him on blood replenisher. You can see him now.’ 

Hermione lets go of my arm and hugs Harry quickly before heading to the room. 

‘I’ll go tell everyone,’ Ginevra says. She gives Harry one last look and then leaves us alone. 

Harry drops down into a chair and I sit next to him

‘Are you all right?’ I ask.

‘I’m fine. They just had to check me for spell residue.’

He looks at me. ‘Ron was hit hard. A _Diffindo_ across his chest. I thought─’

His voice catches. 

I sit next to him. ‘It’s all right,’ I say. 

He lets out a shaky sigh and looks at me. ‘I know I shouldn’t ask you this, but, will you please take me home?’ 

I hesitate. ‘What about Wood?’

He slouches down in his chair and folds his arms across his chest. ‘Fuck.’ 

I reach out and push his hair off his head. He leans into my touch.

‘We could go to mine,’ I say. 

He watches me for a moment, and then he takes my hand and links our fingers together. He lifts both our hands to his lips and kisses the back of my palm.

‘All right,’ he says.  
*

He stays with me for five days. He wears my clothes. He sleeps in my bed. In the mornings I make eggs that he never really eats. In the afternoons we get lost in London, or once, on the continent. We watch movies in the Muggle theatre. I find they don’t make me as nervous as they used to, especially when Harry’s hand is wrapped around my own. He visits Weasley every night, late, so the press can’t follow him. When Hermione’s owl arrives to us early in the morning to say Weasley’s woken up, he physically sags with relief. 

Sometimes I wake to find him sitting at the opposite end of the bed, his legs pulled into his chest, watching me. When I ask him what’s wrong, he doesn’t say. When I call him back to bed, he curls up next to me and I hold him in my arms they way I’ve always wanted to. 

He doesn’t sleep for more than a few hours at a time. I think his nightmares frighten me more that they frighten him. He says he’s used to it. 

I hate his job. I hate what it’s doing to him.

One night I wake up and he’s not there. I find him in my kitchen staring out the window, smoking a cigarette.

When I say his name he starts so hard he knocks his knee onto one of my cabinets. 

‘I’m sorry.’ I say. ‘I didn’t mean to scare you.’ 

He shakes his head and says, ‘You didn’t.’ But his hands are still shaking when he brings the cigarette to his lips. 

‘You hungry?’ I ask. 

He shakes his head. 

I haven’t seen him eat much since he’s been here. He’s lost at least half a stone, maybe more. 

‘Harry,’ I say. ‘You should eat something.’ 

‘You know,’ he says. ‘I don’t know why you keep coming back.’ 

I still. ‘What?’

‘I mean. Every time we― fuck. I treat you like─’ He looks up at me, and then looks away quickly. ‘But you keep coming back.’

He takes a deep drag of his cigarette and looks at me through the rising plume of thick smoke. 

‘Why?’

I lean back on the countertop opposite him. ‘You know why,’ I say softly.

He shakes a bit of ash off his cigarette and scratches at a spot on his chest. 

‘I’m thinking of getting a tattoo, you know,’ he says.

‘A what?’

He smiles. ‘Yeah.’ 

I tap the counter with my fingertips, trying to think of what to say, or why this bothers me so much.

‘You think it’s a bad idea?’ he asks.

‘No, I don’t. I just─ well I suppose it’s better to choose one yourself than to have one chosen for you.’

‘Bugger,’ he says, blowing out a thick wave of smoke my way. ‘I’m sorry.’ 

‘It’s fine.’

‘I wasn’t thinking.’

‘Harry, it’s fine. Get a tattoo. If that’s what you want.’ 

He takes another deep drag of smoke. ‘Tell me something, Malfoy.’ 

‘What? 

‘Why do you think I’m an Auror?’ 

I hesitate. 

‘I think I’m going to need a drink for this.’ 

He shrugs, holding the cigarette between his finger tips and chewing his lip. I reach behind him and I grab two glasses and a bottle of Scotch, the good stuff from the Manor, from the shelf above his head. I pour half a glass for myself and down it quickly. 

He raises his eyebrows. 

‘I think you think you owe us something,’ I say. ‘You still feel guilty about Hogwarts. About everything. This is your atonement. You know people expected you to be in the Corps, and so you do it. No matter how stupid that is.’ 

He takes a drag of his cigarette. His eyes never leave my face. 

‘You think I don’t want to be an Auror.’

‘Yes. That’s what I think.’

He reaches for the bottle of Scotch and pours half a glass. He knocks it back. ‘You’re wrong.’ 

He pours a full glass, knocks that back, too and then he looks at me. 

‘There’s something I want you to know,’ he says. ‘I’m good at what I do, Draco.’

‘I never said you weren’t─’

‘Just shut up for a second,’ he says, raising a hand. ‘I’m good at what I do. I’m not stupid enough to think I owe anyone a thing. I fucking killed Voldemort. My parents are dead. My friends. I’ve given them _enough._ I joined the Aurors because I promised Ron I would. And because I─’

He stops and stubs his cigarette out on the countertop. I don’t say anything, although part of me wants to slap his hands.

Harry looks up at me again. ‘He helped me realise something about myself that I didn’t want to face. He was there for me. And I─’

My stomach sinks as I realise what it is he’s trying to tell me. 

‘You’re in love with him,’ I say softly.

He swallows. ‘I─’

‘All this time?’

He sighs, and then nods. ‘Not anymore though,’ he says. ‘Not like I used to. I know that could never, ever happen. And besides─’

He gives me a long look and then he shakes out another cigarette and lights it with fingertips. His casual use of wandless magic never fails to fascinate me. Or turn me on. He exhales slowly and two long plumes of smoke unfurl from his nostrils.

‘Does Weasley know?’ 

He shakes his head. 

‘Granger?’

‘Yes. She knows,’ he smiles bitterly. ‘Sometimes I think she hates me for it.’ 

I swallow thickly. ‘She doesn’t.’

‘I know,’ he says, nodding a bit. ‘I know.’ 

He looks down and the countertop and idly rubs his index finger in the ash from his cigarette. 

‘Do you?’ he asks

‘What?’ I say, although I know exactly what he’s asking. 

‘Hate me for it?’

_Yes_

‘I want to,’ I say.

He smiles. 

‘You don’t have to, Draco. It’s over now,’ he says.

‘But not because you want it that way.’ 

He looks at me for a moment, and then takes another drag of his cigarette. 

‘We can’t always have what we want,’ he says. 

‘Oh, believe me,’ I say. ‘If anyone knows that, it’s me.’ 

He hesitates. ‘Let’s go back to bed,’ he says. 

He takes my hand and leads me back to my room. I follow close behind, watching the muscles on his back shift with each step he takes forward.


	7. Chapter Seven

A/N This chapter is particularly short, but I hope it holds you over till the next update anyway. :)

*

He wakes me up the following morning by kissing the space between my brows. It makes my skin break out in goose flesh. When I open my eyes he’s hovering above me, his arms braced on either side of my shoulders. He kisses my eyelids. I hold his face in my palms. His stubble has grown into a straggly sort of beard in the last few days. I’m appalled to find that this turns me on. 

He kisses me slowly, and I thread my fingers in the thick hair at the nape of his neck. His tongue swipes across my own and I arch up into him. He’s the best damn kisser I’ve ever had. I almost hate him for that. He pulls away and dots small kisses along my jaw, my neck.

‘Why do you always do that?’ I ask, still sleep foggy and more honest with him than I mean to be. 

He lifts his head. ‘Do what?’ he asks. 

‘Kiss me like you mean it.’ 

His eyes flicker away and back. ‘I do mean it, Draco.’ 

He sits back on his haunches and I pull myself up and lean back against the head board. I push my hair off my face and close my eyes for a moment. He’s fucking with me. I know it. 

When I open my eyes, he’s watching me.

‘What?’ 

He smiles briefly. ‘You’re gorgeous.’ 

My heart stutters. ‘Am I?’ 

He looks away quickly.

‘I’m not in love with him anymore, Draco.’ 

‘You already said that.’ 

‘I just wanted to make sure you understood.’ 

‘Why is it so important that I understand?’ I ask, trying to make him, for once, tell me the truth about how he feels. About what the hell it is we’re doing. 

He slides off the bed.

‘I have to go home,’ he says. ‘I only get a week off if my partner’s injured. Two weeks if he─ well, anyway. I have to get back home. I have to get my things back in order. Find out who they’re pairing me up with until Ron gets back.’ 

‘All right,’ I say. I swing my legs over the side of the bed. 

He opens my cupboard doors. His blood stained Auror robes are on a heap on the bottom. I’d sent his shirt and trousers to be cleaned in the manor. I couldn’t send them his robes. Lucius would ask too many questions. Mother would be entirely too smug.

After he dresses he shrinks the robes and shoves them in his back pocket. 

He walks over to the doorway, but he stops for a moment, gripping his fingers around the wooden frame. With his back to me, he says, ‘I’ll still want my shirt back, you know.’ 

I smile slowly. ‘I’ll want mine back too, Potter.’ 

He turns to look at me and smiles. ‘You’re smarter than you look, Malfoy.’ He taps his finger on the doorframe one last time and then he leaves me.


	8. Chapter Eight

These characters are not mine. They belong to J.K. Rowling. I just play with them for fun.

* 

Pansy loves dinner parties on Fridays. Harry’s been sent off on another asinine suicide mission, and so I go hoping to get thoroughly pissed and have a laugh at Blaise’s expense. 

Greg and Millie aren’t awkward with each other anymore. When Millie started seeing Eloise, things had been tense, but now they smile and laugh with each other the way they used to. I’m glad. It would have gutted me to choose one of my friends over the other, and while I love Millie, I would have chosen Greg. No question. 

Blaise brings his mother’s best wine. When he hands it to Pansy, his fingers brush across hers and she looks up at him with a pinkish tinge across her cheeks. I wonder just how much of my friends’ lives I’ve been missing these past few weeks, holed up in the lab or my flat, thinking about Potter.

I’ve been unaccountably cross with Granger and she doesn’t know why. Weasley’s still on the mend and Rose and Hugo have it in for their new nanny, or so she says. She refuses to use my elf, although the children love her and I’ve offered her several times. She has dark circles around her eyes and even though I’ve given her time off, she still comes into the lab for a few hours every day. I snap at her when we’re in close quarters and she yells right back at me when I’ve cheesed her off. She even pulled me aside after a meeting with the St. Mungo’s head Mediwitch to ask me what the fuck my problem is. I have to hand it to her. She can be a right bitch when she wants to be. And I love her for it. 

 

_‘You’re playing with fire, Draco.’_

That’s what Pansy said to me after the first few times Potter and I fucked around. It was just after my birthday, I remember that. Granger and I had just finished our first year working together. We were celebrating at _The Wiz_. We’d just landed our first big client _and_ Lucius had finally decided to back us with a loan. Needless to say we, all of us, got completely bladdered. Potter was there. He was still just _Potter_ back then. He sucked me off in the bathroom. Somehow he got us both to his place and fucked me over the arm his sofa. I left in the morning without even leaving a note. 

The week after, we met in the Three Broomsticks and I sucked him off in a bathroom stall. Me on my knees in designer trousers with Harry Potter’s hands threaded in my hair. _Me_ with Harry Potter’s spunk in my mouth. When it was over, he pulled me up against his body, kissed me and said, _‘We should do this again, Malfoy.’_ And we did. Every other weekend or so. It was just fucking. That’s what we agreed to. No ties. _‘No bullshit drama,’_ was what he said. He’d just come out. I’d just stopped fucking around with Theo. We were both looking for quick shags and nothing more. 

Then the first time he was hurt on the job I was so fucking scared that I Floo’d over to his place only to find him bruised and exhausted, lying on his couch with his hand over his eyes. I sat next him and put my hand over his heart, just to make sure he was real. That his heart was still working. We snogged lazily for hours, and then I fucked him for the first time. For the first time, I looked into his eyes when he came. And suddenly I _wanted._ That’s the way it is with him. He makes me want things I’d never even thought about before. Things I’d never even admitted to wanting.

It isn’t as small or as stupid as _love._ It’s not like with him and Weasley. I suppose it’s the look in his eyes when he lets me fuck him. Like I’d cut him open. Like I was really _inside_ him. Or the times he’d let me see him, really _see_ the Harry who never, ever wanted any of the shit we put on his shoulders. The Harry I was so fucking jealous of as a child. The Harry, who I think, if he ever thought he could get away with it, would disappear somewhere Unplottable, change his name and never use magic again. The Harry that he keeps so carefully guarded and hidden deep in his eyes. I _saw_ that Harry last month, and I’ve seen him before. And for that, I think, he’ll never forgive me. 

I wonder if he sees Weasley’s face when I fuck him. Does he ever have to stop himself from saying the prat’s name instead of my own? These past few weeks have given me enough time to stew in jealousy. He’s made me entirely irrational. And I completely in wrapped up in him. I know I am. Always have been. And Pansy knows it too. Knows it probably before I did. _‘You’re playing with fire.’_ That was what she told me. 

She was right.

I feel the couch dip next to me, and it’s Pansy. She’s always been there to pull me out of my morbid contemplations. I take a sip from the wineglass I’d completely forgotten about. It’s almost tepid by now. 

‘We need to talk, Draco,’ she says.

I look at her warily. She has her _I’m serious_ face on, and I’m hardly in the mood for it now. 

‘About what?’

She purses her lips. ‘This thing you have with Potter─’ 

I look away. ‘It’s none of your business, Pans.’ 

‘You should listen to her,’ Blaise says, sitting on the other side of me. Millie and Greg slipped away some time ago. I’d been so wrapped up in my own thoughts, I can’t even remember them leaving.

‘Oh, sod off Blaise,’ I say. ‘Just because you’re trying to get into her knickers again─’

Blaise scowls, ‘Hey─’

‘Shut up,’ Pansy says. ‘Both of you.’ 

Blaise sits back and folds his arms, frowning at us both. Twat.

Pansy puts her hand briefly on my arm.

‘Justin’s been asking after you,’ she says. ‘ _Again._ ’ 

‘Oh, Pansy─’

‘No, look,’ she says. ‘What would it hurt for you to go out with someone who cares about you, Draco?’

‘He does care, Pansy,’ I say softly.

She frowns at me. We both know what I’m talking about. Harry had done so many things for me in the past, things only me and Pans really know about. Lucius would be in Azkaban without his help. My business would have never been sanctioned by the ministry. Pansy wouldn’t have her job in the MLE.

Pansy looks me in the eye. ‘He might care for you, Draco,’ she says. ‘Love you, even. But he’s not good for you. And you know it.’ 

I press my lips together. 

‘You don’t know anything about it, Pans.’ 

She sighs, and shares a brief look with Blaise. 

‘When was the last time you saw him?’ she asks. 

‘A couple weeks ago,’ I say, waving a hand. ‘He’s on some sort of stupid mission. I’ll see him when he gets back.’

I can’t keep the uncertainty out of my voice when I say this. My relationship with Harry exists only in Floo calls and infrequent owls. I don’t know when next I’ll see him.

‘Draco,’ Pansy says softly. ‘He’s back.’ 

‘What?’ 

‘He’s been back for weeks.’

I don’t even ask her how she knows. I just know she’s telling me the truth. She’d never lie to me. Not about this. 

She puts her hand on mine.

‘Just one date,’ she says. ‘For me.’ 

I look at her. Her face is wrinkled with concern and I remember, once when we were very young, we were wrapped in each other’s arms and we promised each other we wouldn’t let our families, our enemies or even ourselves hurt either one of us. She’s just trying to keep her promise. I know that. 

I sigh, turn my palm upwards to thread our fingers together and tell her, ‘All right.’


	9. Chapter 9

*  
These characters are not mine. They belong to J.K. Rowling. I just play with them for fun.

* 

We meet for drinks in a Muggle bar.

Justin is sweet. Clean cut. His curly brown hair falls over his collar and curls up behind his ears. We talk about inane things. The weather. The Quidditch league. I catch him staring at me a few times when he thinks I’m not looking. It’s flattering, it is, but -and I know I’m a special kind of arse for thinking it- he’s not Harry. 

He orders another round of drinks and while we’re waiting, he smiles at me and ducks his head. 

‘This isn’t going too well, is it?’ 

I stare and the table and trace the grain of the wood with my fingers. 

‘I’m sorry,’ I say. 

The waitress brings our drinks to the table and I pull my Whisky closer to me.

‘No I get,’ Justin says, shaking his head. He smiles a crooked smile. ‘I’m just utterly ridiculous and I hoped I could change your mind.’ 

I shift uncomfortably in my chair. ‘I’m a shit date.’ 

‘No, really, Draco, it’s fine, I─’ He stops for a moment, his eyes widening. ‘Fuck.’ 

His eyes are fixed on something behind me. 

‘What?’ I twist in in chair to turn around, but he puts his hand over mine to stop me.

‘No don’t look,’ he says. ‘It’s your ex.’ 

My stomach drops. ‘Harry?’

‘And Wood. No really, Draco, don’t look. They’re─ well, they’re snogging.’ 

‘Oh,’ I say stupidly. I take a deep sip of my drink.

‘What a git,’ Justin says. ‘I’m sorry, Draco.’ 

My fingers are shaking. Justin watches me from behind his glass. 

‘Just keep talking to me,’ he says. ‘He’s spotted us. Wood, too.’ 

‘This is ridiculous. Of all the places─’ 

‘I know,’ he says. ‘I used to bum around here with a few of my mates, but I’d never thought to see Harry Potter.’ 

I sigh. ‘He’s probably trying to avoid the press,’ I tell him.

‘They’re sitting down. He can’t stop looking at you.’ 

‘Are you serious?’ 

‘I am. He looks right buggered I’ll tell you that. What’s the story with you two, eh? Boot seems to think you’re just fuck buddies, but it seems more than that to me.’ 

‘Does it?’ 

‘Oh, come off it, Draco. I’ve been making eyes at you for the last half hour and you haven’t noticed.’ 

‘I’ve noticed.’ 

‘But you’re just not interested. And he’s looking at me like I’m a flobberworm at the end of his wand.’ 

I try not to feel too pleased by that. ‘It’s complicated,’ I say.

‘Right.’ 

‘Is he still─?’

‘Staring? Yes.’

I sigh. The back of my neck is burning. ‘I think we should go,’ I say.

Justin knocks back the rest of his drink, ‘I’m right there with you.’ 

We both stand and grab our coats from the back of our chairs. The exit is close to us, so luckily, I don’t even have to look Harry’s way before we leave. As much as I want to see him, Justin’s right. I won’t look. 

I’m about to pull on my jacket, but he takes from me and holds it up with raised brows. I turn around and shrug into my coat, wondering what he’s playing at. I’ve been the worst sort of date tonight. He can’t possibly still be interested. When I turn back to face him, I give him a small smile 

‘Look, Justin,’ I say. ‘I really am sorry.’ 

He gives me a longing look and his mouth twitches. ‘I’m sorry, too,’ he says. ‘You have no idea.’ 

My face heats up. I’m flushed. I’m sure of it. 

He leans into me and I press my palm flat against his chest.

‘What are you doing?’ 

His eyes flick to where I know Harry’s sitting. ‘He’s watching,’ he says softly.

I feel a sudden warmth flow through my body. It’s petty, I know it is, but what would happen if for once, Harry could see that _I_ could be wanted, too?

‘Kiss me,’ he says, with a small smile. ‘Show him what he’s missing.’ 

I swallow. ‘As if you don’t have any ulterior motives,’ I say hoarsely. 

Justin grins, leans forward and then kisses me softly on the lips. When I relax into him, he angles his head to the right and when I sigh into his mouth, he slips in his tongue, swiping it gently across my own and I don’t think about the sound of glass breaking behind us.  


: : :

  
It’s almost four in the morning when my Floo chimes. It’s him. I’ve been expecting it. When he lands in my in my fireplace and steps out into my living room, I can smell the whiskey on his breath. I wave my wand to flick on the lights. When I look at him I can’t help the small sound of dismay that escapes my throat.

On his neck is an angry red scar, traveling up from his collarbone to just beneath his ear. It stands out starkly against his skin and the white button down shirt he’s wearing. When he sees me staring, his face flushes and he tugs uselessly at his collar. 

‘It’s nothing,’ he says. ‘Just didn’t get to the Dittany in time.’ 

‘How did it happen?’ I say softly.

‘Just some completely gormless git with a knife,’ he says airily. 

I get the impression he’s being deliberately blasé so he won’t set me off. 

‘I actually forgot about it until a moment ago,’ he says. ‘I didn’t want you to see…but then tonight, I saw you. With _him_. And─ anyway, I was just giving it time to heal.’ 

I lean in closer to him and trace my finger along the length of his scar. It’s smoother than it looks, but it still bears the mark of something shoddily done. It occurs to me that it’s likely he’d almost died. That there was probably some quick thinking on someone’s part in order to save his life. I’m surprised at the spark of anger in my chest, and how quickly it comes. At how much I want to hurt the prat who did this to him. 

‘I didn’t want you to see it,’ he says softly. When I look into his eyes he smiles crookedly. 

‘You might talk me into something rational,’ he says. ‘Like quitting.’

I laugh, although it’s moist and very brief. 

‘As if I ever could,’ I say.

He shrugs. ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ he says. ‘Maybe you were a little bit right.’ 

I raise an eyebrow. 

‘About the whole atonement idea,’ he says. 

‘Ah.’ 

His eyes drop down to my bare chest, and his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. 

‘Is he here?’ he asks. 

I sigh and step away from him. ‘No.’ 

He just looks and me for a moment, and I walk behind the half wall that separates the living room and the kitchen. 

I open the refrigerator door, pretending to look for something ─ridiculous, we both know the only thing I store in here are potions that need a more than just a cooling charm. He pushes the door shut with his open palm and spins me around hard, pressing my back against the door.

‘Are you fucking him?’ he asks. 

‘No.’ 

Harry lets out a rush of air through his nose and I push him off me, step aside and lean into the countertop, crossing my arms against my chest.

I catch his eye. ‘Not yet,’ I say. 

Harry gives me a hard look and pulls my hips. I lurch forward, pushing us both to the opposite counter and he kisses me hard on the mouth. 

‘Don’t fuck him,’ he says when he pulls away. ‘Don’t─’

He kisses me again, burying his fingers into my hips. I know they’ll be bruised tomorrow. 

I wrench away from his grasp, push his shirt upwards and then I yank it over his head, trapping his arms. I press him into the countertop hard with my hips. He grunts sharply. 

‘Why the fuck shouldn’t I?’ I ask.

He presses his body flush against mine and pushes me a few steps back towards the fridge door. My head slams back onto the stainless steel and I grimace.

He pulls his arms out of his shirt and drops it on the floor, and then he presses our chests together and traces my collar bone with his tongue. The door handle of the fridge presses uncomfortably into my side. 

‘Because,’ he says. 

I scratch my nails along his sides and he hisses, arching his back. 

‘Because what?’ I ask, nipping the underside of his chin. ‘Selfish prick.’

He groans and tilts his neck back, and I trace his new scar with my tongue. He pinches my arsecheeks hard and I lift one of my legs, hooking it around his hip and pressing my now hard cock against the front of his jeans. 

‘Because, I don’t want you to,’ he says. He presses his lips against mine, pushing them open with his tongue. I relax my jaw beneath him and let his tongue mingle with mine. He groans deeply in his chest and then I bite his bottom lip hard. He flinches and pulls away from me, pressing his hand to his mouth. 

‘Not good enough,’ I say. 

He wipes his lip with his thumb, glancing briefly and the small spot of blood there and then narrows his eyes and says, ‘How’s this then?’ 

He drops down onto his knees and pulls down the soft cotton sweatpants I’d been sleeping in. 

My cock juts upward into his face.

‘Look at you,’ he says softly before taking the head of my cock into his mouth.

My knees almost buckle at the sweetness of it. His mouth is hot and tight and I rest my hand on the back of his head. 

‘Oh, fuck.’

He presses his palms on my legs to hold my hips back and takes the entire length of my cock down his throat. 

‘Oh Jesus fuck, Harry.’

He leans back on his haunches and hollows his cheeks, looking right into my eyes as he sucks my cock, hard and fast, just the way I like. His green eyes just fucking glow in the dark. 

‘Harry.’ 

He sucks my cock hard one last time and then lifts his mouth off, teasing the head with the tip of his tongue and then licking his lips in a way that almost makes me come right into his smug prick face. 

He smiles at me as if reading my thoughts. ‘Turn around, baby,’ he says. 

And then, _and then,_ oh sweet Christ, his hands are parting my arse cheeks and his mouth is on my hole. I’m bent over almost halfway, gripping the flat surface of the fridge for dear life as he eats me out, his tongue slicking along the ring of muscle of my arsehole and flicking inside. When he puts his fingers inside me, it’s almost too much. I’m so close to coming all over my fridge door, without even having his cock inside me. 

He stands up and I hear him stepping out of his jeans and wetly stroking his cock a few times before he’s bent over me. He presses slow inside me until were flush against each other, and then he runs his palm upwards my chest, brushing my nipples and making me cry out, pulling me up so that my back presses against his chest. He pulls out halfway and slams back into me again and I arch upward against him, turning my head so I can catch his mouth and we kiss with hot puffing breaths, his hand circling my throat, before he pulls away and presses into me again. 

He presses his lips against the back of my neck. ‘Don’t fuck him,’ he says, not stopping the movement of his hips as he thrusts into me. 

I lean forward again, pressing my palms against the fridge.

‘I won’t,’ I say. ‘I won’t. Just fuck me, Harry.’ 

He pulls out almost completely and enters me so hard we end up pressed into the fridge, me on the tips of my toes and my cock sliding slickly along the stainless steel. I grunt and push my hips back into him, almost throwing him off of me. He bites hard into my shoulder and I twist my arm backwards to grab his hips.  
I can feel my orgasm bearing down on me, almost painful in its intensity. I don’t need to put my hand on myself to come when Harry’s inside of me. I never do. I can feel my balls drawing up and threads of spunk start to fly from my cock and land on the door of the fridge, the floor. He speeds up again and comes inside of me and we’re both pressed into the fridge covered in come and breathing hard. He kisses the back of my neck and instead of feeling sated and full, I feel completely empty and utterly alone. 

‘Get off,’ I say. 

He pushes himself off of my body, and I feel the familiar ache his cock being pulled out of my arse. 

When I turn around I shove him hard in the chest. 

_‘Why are you fucking with me?’_ I’m ashamed when my voice cracks at the end of my sentence. 

He looks away. ‘I’m not. I─ I don’t meant to.’

‘You’re fucking with me, Harry. You act like you give a shit if I’m bent over Finch-Fletchley, but you don’t even care. You wave your dick around _all the time_ , and I don’t say anything─ _anything_ when you fuck around on me.’

‘I don’t fuck around on you, Draco! We’re not even─’ He waves his hand around in a vague gesture.

‘That’s the fucking problem. We’re nothing. I’m _nothing_ to you.’ I shove him hard in the chest and he falls backwards for a few steps until he gets his bearings again. I bend over to pick up my sweats and start forcing my legs into each side.

He reaches out for me, and I jerk away. ‘Harry, please, just go.’ 

‘Draco─’

‘Please, Harry.’ 

‘Wait, let me just say this, all right? You’re not nothing. Okay. _You’re not._ And you freak me the fuck out, and… I don’t know what to do half the time. Tonight. I’ve never been so jealous, of anyone. Ever.’ 

He runs both of his hands through his hair, setting it even more on end than usual. ‘I don’t know what else to tell you…maybe I’m just fucking everything up because I don’t know what to do with this.’ 

He runs his hands through his hair again and then starts to pick up his clothes, pulling them on piece by piece. I fold my arms across my chest and wait for him to finish. 

After he pulls on his shirt, he looks at me and says, ‘You’re not nothing, Draco.’ 

I press my palms into the countertop behind me. ‘Why do you do it, then?’ 

He takes a deep breath and looks at his shoes. ‘Because I’m fucked up? Because I don’t know what to do with myself half the time? Because, I don’t deserve you? I don’t know.’ 

I sigh. ‘You think jealousy is enough? You think that’s all I want from you?’ 

He sighs and stuffs his hands into his pockets. ‘I can’t do anything about the way I am, Draco.’ 

I sigh, turning my back to him. ‘I can’t do this anymore, Harry.’ 

‘Don’t do that to me,’ he says, touching my arm. I pull away. 

‘Come on, Draco. Please.’ 

‘I’ve given you enough, Harry,’ I say softly. ‘And you fuck me over every time. Just… go home to Oliver.’ 

I take a deep breath and close my eyes. 

I don’t even look over my shoulder when he Disapparates.


	10. Chapter Ten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long. ;)

* 

Somehow, drinks with Justin becomes a regular thing. Usually we meet with Pansy and Blaise, but sometimes we’re alone. I’ve taken him to a few Wizarding pubs he’s never been to and he’s taken me to a sodding football match. We’re just friends, but I know he wants more. Sometimes I do too. Justin’s nice. He’s reliable. He tells me everything. I could almost sometimes, even see myself with him.

And then Harry gets into my head. 

I’ve been ignoring his owls. It’s been almost three weeks since I’ve seen him last and he’s owled me twice since. I can’t keep doing what I’ve been doing with him. It’s taking too much from me. 

I’m meeting Justin tonight for drinks in a gay bar in some Muggle district he’s familiar with. We Apparate together behind a phone booth and in an alleyway with a dumpster that smells like piss. We’re both a little tipsy from having drinks at his place while I helped him figure out what to wear. I swear the git has the worst fashion sense of any man I’ve ever met, and that includes Harry. 

It’s cold. I pull my coat close against my neck, and Justin and I walk arm in arm to the huge bouncer at the door. 

The bouncer glances at us briefly and then steps aside to let us through, and Justin smacks me on the arse as we walk through the thin, beer smelling hallway to the bar and says, ‘I knew it was good idea bringing you here!’ 

I give him a look, ‘What are you on about?’

Justin grins as we stop by the coat check and hand in our scarves and coats. 

‘If you think I’ve ever gotten inside this bar without standing in line for _at least_ half an hour, you’d be wrong.’ 

‘Bollocks.’ 

‘It’s the truth.’ 

I push him along and we find an empty pair of stools next to the bar and we both sit. 

‘Well if that’s the truth,’ I say. ‘It’s only because you’ve never known how to dress yourself.’ 

He flips two fingers at me and waves at the bartender. 

‘Whatever’s on the tap for me, and a whiskey for my mate.’ 

I look around the bar; it’s full of young men like me and Justin. They’re probably all here looking for a quick shag. I’m starting to wonder if that’s why I’m here, too. 

When the bartender brings our drinks, I knock back almost half and drop my glass onto the table top. 

‘Easy,’ Justin says, taking a swig of his bitter. 

I glance at him. ‘Sorry.’ 

‘Do you want to talk about it?’

I look away. The dance floor is starting to fill up with young twinks with their shirts unbuttoned, ready to pull it off at the slightest sign of sweat. Or interest. There’s one or three or four who look just like Harry to me. It’s pathetic. I’m pathetic.

‘No,’ I say. 

It’s utterly ridiculous that I could be here with someone else, someone who wants me, and I’m thinking of Harry. He’s been a bastard to me for almost three years, and I keep going back and I don’t know why. Maybe I’m some sort of masochist.

‘Draco.’ 

I look down and Justin’s hand is on my thigh. 

‘What is it?’ 

I put my hand on his, and suddenly I feel like dancing with him. I want to be one of those twinks on the dance floor. I don’t want to give a fuck anymore. I get up and pull him off his stool.

‘Dance with me,’ I say, pulling his hand forward and making his body lurch into mine. 

He looks at me warily, but his face is flushed. ‘You’re pissed.’ 

‘I’m not.’ 

_I am._

He reaches for his drink, knocks it back quickly and drops it on the counter. It teeters slightly before righting itself. 

‘Come on then,’ he says.

And then we’re both on the dance floor surrounded by sweating bodies and strobe lights and the music that matches my heartbeat thump-by-thump; and his hands are on my back and mine are gripping his arse, and we keep dancing until the song is over; and the next song; and the one after that.  
*

It’s after four when we stumble into my flat, pressed up against each other, our coats a bundled mess between our bodies. Justin presses me up against the wall and he tries to straighten himself out. We both lurch to the right and he stretches his arms out on either side of my head, pushing himself off my body, putting us both upright. I let my head drop back against the wall and close my eyes. The room is spinning. I have no idea how we’re both not splinched to pieces.

‘Draco,’ Justin says softly. ‘I know I said I could be friends with you, but sometimes like now, when I’m pissed. It’s really, really hard.’

I lift my head up and open my eyes. His face is only inches away from mine. His lashes are blond. I didn’t notice that before. 

I sigh and pull away. ‘And when I tease you, it’s worse. I’m sorry.’

He stops me with a hand on my forearm. 

‘You weren’t teasing me,’ he says. ‘You were thinking about Harry.’

‘I was, and it’s not fair to you.’

‘We’re friends. You can think about whoever you want.’ 

‘Justin─’

‘I said I could be friends with you, Draco.’

I lean forward and press my lips against his, and he groans and presses out bodies together, pushing me against the wall. He nips on my lower lip and I gasp and pull back, knocking my head into the wall behind me. 

‘Now you’re teasing me,’ he says, his voice rough with lust.

‘Sorry.’ 

He looks me in the eye for a long moment and then rests his forehead against mine. 

‘You’re not happy with him,’ he says. 

‘Sometimes I am.’ 

He sighs. ‘Draco. Is he really─’

But whatever he’s about to say gets lost in the echoing tap of an owl’s beak against my window. It’s Lily. I pull away from him, drop my coat onto the floor and open the window to let her in. 

She looks furious with me and she nips my finger harshly before dropping an envelope in my palm.

It says the same thing he always says. I set the letter to flames with my wand and tell Lily, ‘No response.’

She gives me one last reproachful look, makes a nuisance of herself by fluttering around my head, and then sets off. I douse the flames with a charm.

It doesn’t take long for Justin’s arms to wrap around my waist, or for my head to fall back onto his shoulder. I put my hands over his and I think about what it means to be held like this. That I haven’t been held this way in too long. 

I hesitate. ‘Justin─’

He drops his hands and sighs. 

‘I’ll make us some coffee.’

Fifteen minutes later, we’re both staring sleepily into our mugs and Lily taps at my window again. I wave my wand, opening the window and she flies in, dropping a piece of parchment onto the table top. I open it with shaking fingers. 

_Draco, please._

The two words stand starkly out against the off-white parchment, like an exclamation point straight into my heart. I clench the parchment between my fingers and set fire to this one too, which Justin quickly tapers with his wand. 

‘Draco, maybe you should─’

‘No,’ I say. ‘I know what he wants.’ 

Justin watches me for a moment and then he stands and takes both our cups away, banishing them to the sink with a wave of his wand. Then he takes my hand and pulls me up off the chair into his arms and holds me close. I don’t think about it when I kiss him this time. I don’t think about Harry when he kisses me back.   
: : :


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Justin-inside-of-me feels nothing like Harry-inside-of-me.

  
_These characters are not mine. They belong to J.K. Rowling. I just play with them for fun._

* 

Justin-inside-of-me feels nothing like Harry-inside-of-me. 

In a way, this comforts me. I can create separation in my head. This is Justin fucking me. _Justin’s_ hands stroking my side, _Justin_ saying my name softly, under his breath. 

His eyes flicker open as he enters me and he looks at me as if he can’t really believe that I’m here. As if he can’t believe what’s happening. 

Neither can I. 

I stroke his sides with my fingertips and he leans into me, kissing me softly. I moan into his mouth and arch my back, pressing our groins together.

This is Justin fucking me. It isn’t Harry anymore.

: : : 

When I open my eyes, he’s still there, pressed up against my back. My fingers are shaking, my stomach is clenched, my head is spinning, my face is wet and I must, I _must_ close my eyes again.

: : : 

When I wake, he is no longer beside me, and the midmorning light is flooding into my bedroom. My mouth feels like cotton and my head feels empty. Numb.

I catch a brief glimpse of an owl flitting about outside my window and I know immediately and without a doubt that it is Lily. 

I pull on a pair of cotton trousers and cross the room to let her in. She nips my finger harshly before allowing me to take her letter. No one could ever accuse her of disloyalty. 

It’s simply a piece of folded parchment, torn at the edges, as if it were done hastily, and as a last resort. 

I unfold it with shaking fingers. 

_Draco,_

_I have no reason to expect you to trust me. But I need to see you. I’m outside. When he leaves, will you please just talk to me? That’s all I ask._

_-H_

I let out a breath I didn’t even realise I was holding and glance out the window, hoping to see him. But I don’t.

‘Is he out there?’ 

I almost jump out of my skin. When I turn, Justin is looking at me carefully, fully dressed and leaning against the door frame, his arms folded across his chest. 

‘Somewhere,’ I say. 

‘He wants to see you?’

‘Yes.’

He uncrosses his arms and looks at me. I shrug my shoulders and look away, wrapping my arms around myself. I hear him cross the room and feel the brief touch of his lips against the back of my neck. My pores raise instantly.

‘Owl me later,’ he says. A few seconds later I feel him Disapparate. 

I don’t know how I feel about the fact that he can leave me so easily. Maybe he just understands this thing between me and Harry better than I do. Maybe leaving is the only way he can spare himself. I don’t know. I don’t fully understand how he feels about me. But I won’t lie to myself and pretend I’m not relieved to see him go. 

I send Harry my hastily written response and he knocks at my door in less than a minute. 

When I open it, he looks tired, but he smiles at me anyway. 

‘Hey,’ he says. 

‘Hey.’

I drink him in, this man --this presence that’s been in my life ever since I can remember. He has a few days of stubble on his chin and his hair is windswept, as if he flew here on his broom or, Merlin forbid, he’s been waiting out in the cold all night. 

His black jacket, my favourite of his, is unzipped and his shirt is wrinkled. His lips are pink and swollen, as if he’s been chewing on it the way he does when he’s confused or afraid. His glasses are smudged. Those eyes, those _fucking_ eyes shine like two deep green pools of -Narcissus, and like the ill-fated, _stupid man_ , I get lost in them every single time. 

He smiles crookedly. ‘Draco, may I come in?’

‘Oh, of course,’ I say, like a fool, and step aside. 

He smells like his sandalwood scented deodorant and strangely enough, peppermint. 

He leads the way to my bedroom and I follow him a few paces behind. 

Because I know him the way I know the back of my hand, I know why he’s taking me there. He wants ―no, he _needs_ to see for himself. He needs to know if I’ve fucked him. 

I watch his face as he takes it all in. The rumpled sheets. The half open drawer on my side table. The shirt hanging off the edge of my bed. The faint smell of sex. 

He sits at the edge of the bed and lightly fingers my duvet. I lean against the doorway and watch his face.

When he looks up at me, his expression is solemn. 

‘You’ve slept with him,’ he says.

‘Yes.’

‘A lot?’

‘Last night was the first time.’

His eyes flick to mine, and then trail away gazing at the pair of jeans on the floor, at the empty condom packets on my dresser. 

‘Do you love him?’ he asks.

I hesitate. ‘No,’ I say.

‘But you fucked him anyway,’ he says softly. ‘That’s not like you.’

I look away. ‘You don’t get to ask me questions like that.’

He places his hands in his lap. His throat working, it takes him a few tries to attempt the question that I know is on his mind. It’s been on my mind, too. I’ve been wondering why I let it happen.

‘Did he—did he―’ He can’t finish the sentence. 

‘Did he fuck me?’ I say for him. ‘Yes, he did.’

The look he gives me is so shattered, so complete in its betrayal that I almost want to scream in sheer frustration. 

‘Don’t you dare look at me like that, Harry Potter,’ I say. ‘You don’t get to make me feel guilty. You of all people. ’

He looks away and after a moment, I sit next to him on the bed. 

He radiates heat. Being near him again is like a drug. 

‘He was inside of you,’ he says softly. 

He looks and me and then lifts his hand to slowly caress my face with his fingertips. His eyes are wide, desperately seeking mine, but I can’t face the look he’s giving me. 

‘You know,’ he says softly. ‘No one’s ever been inside of me but you.’ 

His thumb traces the line of my lips and I close my eyes briefly. ‘Ever,’ he says. 

I look at him and he smiles wanly. 

‘So this is what it feels like,’ he says. 

I don’t release him from my gaze; I will give him no quarter in this. ‘It is,’ I tell him. 

He pulls his hand away from me, and wipes his face harshly. 

‘I deserve it,’ he says tonelessly. ‘I know, I deserve it.’

‘Don’t do that,’ I say. ‘Don’t make this into another story about what the world has done to Harry Potter.’

And with that, I think I’ve broken him. His face crumples and his eyes deaden, but only for a brief moment. After the flash of pain his face settles into deep lines of misery. But I’ve seen his heart break. He can’t hide it from me. And it’s given me some reassurance. And maybe that’s what this whole thing has been about. 

He swipes at a stray tear on his cheek. 

‘Do you know what upsets me the most?’ he asks, his voice thick. ‘It’s that I _know_ he’s good for you. I know he’s better for you than me.’

‘Harry―’

‘I’m _nothing_ , don’t you see, Draco? I try to fill myself up with things, with drugs, with... people. With sex. But it’s never enough, Draco. It’s never enough to fill me up with _something..._ something to look George in the face again, or something to say to Teddy when he asks me about his parents―’ 

I grab his hand from where it lies shaking on his knee. ‘You can’t take this with you everywhere Harry. You have to let it go.’

‘I can’t let it go,’ he cries. ‘I can’t. I can’t. I can’t―’

I pull him into my arms and he holds on to me so tight it takes the wind out of me or a moment. 

‘You have to, Harry,’ I say into his hair. ‘You have to let it go.’ 

His body shudders against mine, and I know he’s trying to hold back a lifetime of tears, a lifetime of solitude, a lifetime of trying to hide from me and the rest of the world, so that we can never know the truth. 

Except, anyone who really knows him already knows the truth. 

He’s still the scared little boy in the cupboard under the stairs. Killing Voldemort didn’t change that.

Maybe nothing will. 

So I rub circles into his back and tell him to let go of the things I’m afraid he can never ever really say goodbye to.

: : :


	12. Chapter 12

  
_**A/N Pretty short chapter, but the next one is super long. We're almost to the end, guys! :)**_

_These characters are not mine. They belong to J.K. Rowling. I just play with them for fun._

* 

He’s been in the bathroom for more than ten minutes and I don’t know whether I should knock on the door or not.

I dither about in the hallway, pressing my ear on the door every few minutes to reassure myself with the sounds of his movements. When five more minutes pass and he doesn’t come out, I bang on the door a few times.

‘Harry, come on.’

I press my palm and against the door and try the doorknob with my other hand, only to find that he’s locked it. 

‘Harry, open the fucking door.’ 

I hear the unexpectedly heart-wrenching sound his jacket makes against against the other side of the door and he slides straight down to the floor. I drop to my knees, pressing my palms against the door that separates us.

‘Harry,’ I say softly. 

His voice comes across, faint and muffled. 

‘I just need a minute,’ he says.

I sit back on my haunches and consider an unlocking charm. ‘Harry, you’re scaring me,’ I say. 

‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘Don’t worry. I’m fine. I just need a minute.’

I hear the click and snap of his lighter. Half of me wants to hex the dolt for smoking in my bathroom, and the other half wants to blast the door open and strangle him for scaring me so much.

A few more minutes pass before he makes another sound. 

‘Ron and I aren’t speaking,’ he says. 

‘Why not?’

‘He’s leaving the Corps.’

I let out a small sigh because I think I saw this one coming. Hermione’s been hinting at it for weeks.

‘The accident?’ 

‘Yes.’ 

I press my back against the door in the same position I know he is, so that our bodies mirror each other, and so that maybe, he can feel me on the other side. 

‘I suppose you didn’t take it well,’ I say.

He doesn’t answer for a moment. 

‘No,’ he says. ‘I didn’t.’

‘He has a family, Harry. It’s different for him.’

‘I know.’

‘If something happened to him, think of Hermione and the kids.’

‘I know. I just― I don’t know if I can do it without him.’

I close my eyes and rest the back of my head against the door. 

‘Harry,’ I say. ‘Is this about, you know, what you told me? Is this about how you feel about him?’

I don’t know how I manage the sentence with an even tone. As it is, my heart is thumping in my chest and my throat is feels like it’s closing up. Somehow, in the grande scheme of our fucked up relationship, I’d forgotten his feelings for Weasley. Stupid of me, really.

I hear him shift and then I hear the soft snap of metal when he unlocks the door. I scramble up off the floor and open the door. He’s sitting on the floor with his ankle crossed and his back against my tub, his eyes red rimmed and a lit cigarette poised between his fingertips. 

I sit on the toilet bowl and wait for him to answer me. 

He takes a deep drag of his cigarette and I can tell he’s avoiding my eyes.

‘It isn’t,’ he says, exhaling plumes of smoke through his nostrils. ‘I told you I don’t feel that way about him anymore.’

For some reason, I don’t feel at all reassured. He must see it in my face because he stubs out his cigarette on the floor and then pushes himself closer towards me, resting his chin on my knee and locking me in his gaze. 

The gesture is so tender and so unlike him that I can’t help but run my fingers through his hair and gently caress his face. 

He leans into my touch and closes his eyes briefly. 

‘It’s more than that, Draco,’ he says. 

‘Tell me,’ I say, not stopping he slow movement of my hand raking smoothly through his hair. 

‘He’s my best mate, he’s―’ He stops for a minute and wraps one of his arms around my calf, hugging my leg and pulling himself closer to me. 

‘He’s been there for everything. _Through_ everything. He saved me from that Horcrux. He sat next to me on the train. He’s my partner, Draco. He’s the only partner I ever want.’

My hand sills in his hair, and he looks up at me. 

He takes my hand in his. ‘Not like that, Draco,’ he says. ‘That’s you.’

My heart jumps straight into my throat. 

‘Is it?’ I say faintly. 

‘It is.’

He kisses my palm. 

‘It is,’ he says again. 

‘Harry―’ 

He puts his index finger on my lips, and it’s only then I notice his hands are shaking. 

‘Just wait,’ he says. ‘Before you say no... I want to tell you something. Oliver’s moved out. I asked him to. Weeks ago. I know I’m maybe too late. I know you’re seeing someone else. But just give me another go at it. I know I don’t deserve it, Draco. I know I don’t. But please. Please consider it.’

Of their own accord, it seems, my fingers begin stroking through his hair again. 

‘He’s moved out?’ I ask. It’s the only thing I can think to say. 

‘He did. Draco, we weren’t―’ 

He looks up at me and my hand drops down to his cheek. ‘I didn’t love him.’

I thread my fingers through the thick hair at his nape and grasp the back of his head tightly. 

‘What are you saying, Harry?’

He pushes himself up onto his knees, crawling into the space between my legs, and then he wraps his arms around my waist pressing the side of his face against my chest. 

‘I’m saying I need you to give me another chance. Even though I’ve had enough. Even though I don’t deserve it.’

I push him gently off of me and hold his face in my palms.

‘Is this just because you’re jealous, Harry?’ I ask. ‘Is this a pissing contest?’

He swallows. ‘No, Draco. It’s not.’

I drop my hands and lean back against the toilet.

‘What do you want, exactly?’ 

‘A chance. A date. Something. Anything. Just don’t cut me off again. These past few weeks have been―’ He runs his fingers through his hair. ‘ They’ve been really bad. I did things, _stupid_ things to try to forget you, but I couldn’t. I can’t. I need you in my life, Draco.’

He takes my hand and presses it over his heart.

‘You’re there,’ he says. ‘You’re inside. You always have been. Ever since the first time you were inside me. And I’ve been running ever since. And I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry I’ve fucked up so much, and wasted too much time and given you so much shit to deal with.’

‘Why do you hide from me? Why do you run?’ 

He takes a deep breath and he hesitates a few times before answering me. 

‘Because it hurts less if I run, Draco,’ he says. ‘Because you haven’t even begun to see the measure of how fucked up I am. And I’m afraid if I let you see. You’ll disappear.’

‘How fucked up are you? Tell me.’

He drops my hand. ‘I―’

I grab his hand again, hard. ‘Tell me, Harry. I want everything from you. Nothing less. That’s the deal here. If I take you back, I take everything. The good and the bad. And you have to tell me now what I’m getting into.’ 

He looks at me for a long moment, his Adam’s apple working in his throat, and I can literally see the battle going on in his head. He’s so afraid of me, and I don’t know how to tell him he doesn’t have to be. But he has to trust me. I have to have at least that. 

He pulls away from me and my heart drops. I watch him stand slowly, watch him walk to the doorway. He stops, gripping the doorframe so hard his knuckles turn white. 

‘Okay,’ he says, although I can barely hear him. 

He turns to me, and I can tell he’s close to crying again. I think I am, too. 

‘I’ll tell you everything.’

I nod and smile at him, and after a while he smiles back at me and says, ‘Just not in your bathroom, okay?’

: : : 


	13. Chapter Thirteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I lead him to the kitchen and he hovers around me as I make him a cup of tea.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter, guys! :) Thanks for sticking with me!
> 
> Thanks to Queenie_Mab and MariannaMerlo for the Alpha and Beta :)

*  


These characters are not mine. They belong to J.K. Rowling. I just play with them for fun. 

*

 

I lead him to the kitchen and he hovers around me as I make him a cup of tea.

When I hand it to him, he accepts with shaking hands, and he takes bit longer than usual to finish drinking it. I wonder if he can taste the calming potion I slipped in when he wasn’t looking.

As if he reads my thoughts, he gives me a small smile and nods. ‘Thank you,’ he says. ‘I needed that.’

I take the cup from him and he leans into me, placing a kiss on my cheek. I don’t know why, but it makes my heart race. I drop the cup into the sink and he takes my hand, leading me past the half wall that separates my little kitchen from the living room.

I sit next to him, and he takes off his jacket, draping it over the arm of the sofa directly behind him. We sit facing each other for a moment before he starts wringing his hands in his lap, again and again and again.

I gently place my hand on his and he looks at me with the most haunted expression I’ve ever seen.

‘I don’t know where to start,’ he says.

I link our fingers together. ‘You said you did stupid things these past few weeks. What did you do?’

He pulls his hand out of my grasp and runs his fingers through his hair, leaving it standing even more on end than usual.

He opens and closes his mouth several times, and I rest my hand on his knee. He looks at it vaguely and then locks his eyes with mine.

‘I’ll have to show you,’ he says.

I’m momentarily confused until he shifts and pulls a small drawstring pouch from his pocket and I hear the clink of glass inside. Immediately my stomach sinks.

He looks at me nervously again before pulling on the drawstring and pulling out, one by one, several small vials.

‘Belladonna,’ he says. ‘Different formulas, _Euphoria, Make me Forget, Give me Time, Do Overs_... I have everything. I don’t even have to buy them anymore.’He glances up at me. ‘Being an Auror has its perks occasionally.’

‘Oh, fuck, Harry.’

He lifts a vial from his lap, holding it up for me to see. ‘Make Me Forget. It gives you an hour in an alternate reality, you chose which memories you want to keep, which ones you don’t.’ He closes the vial in his palm. ‘I can be anything I want. Anyone I want. I can be with anyone I want,’ He drops the vial back into his lap where it clinks and rattles with the others. ‘I always choose you.’

I’ve gone completely numb, and I can hear the blood rushing in my ears. The sheer idiocy it takes to even think about taking these potions is astounding. It’s not at all like the Mallowsweet I’ve seen him on before. A single extraneous drop of Belladonna in any one of these potions could kill a grown man in under an hour. I’ve spent hours on countless proposals to the Ministry imploring for the regulated use of Belladonna and it always gets shut down by the fucking hippie loving Lib Dems. Hermione and I could make enough an entirely new business enterprise simply formulating antidotes or healing potions to suppress the long term effects of Belladonna on the nervous system. He knows how much I fight against recreational drugs in my profession. I can’t even look at him. I don’t know what to say.

He seems to sense this, so he picks up another vial. ‘ _Euphoria,_ ’ he says. ‘Ultimate happiness. Whatever you can think of, for two hours, you can make it real. The illusions are almost always near perfect.’

‘Stop explaining,’ I say brusquely. ‘I know what they are. I know what they do.’ I reach into his lap and take the vial of pitch black viscous liquid. ‘And I know what this does, as well.’

‘ _Queen Mab,_ ’ he says, slowly. ‘Mallosweet. Asphodel. Belladonna. Ultimate pain. Complete Bliss.’

I try my best to ignore the note of longing in his voice. ‘Have you taken this, Harry?’

‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Only a few times’

‘Do you know what it does? What could happen if you take it too often?’

‘Yes,’ he says, glancing at me briefly.

‘Harry—’

‘It could kill me,’ he says. ‘I know. Believe me; I thought about it a lot. But I’m not a coward. I’m not going to off myself with this.’

I take all the vials from his lap and then, with a vicious curse, banish them all to the fucking ether.

He looks at my empty hands for a long moment. ‘I could get more if I wanted, you know,’ he says softly.

‘You won’t,’ I say firmly. ‘Not if you want a chance with me, Harry.’

He looks up at me and then he nods slowly, looking as though it causes him physical pain to agree with me. He tugs at a hangnail with his teeth, and I wince as blood pools under the skin.

‘There’s more,’ he says.

‘Tell me.’

He pulls a final vial out from his bag, and I know instantly what it is.

‘Polyjuice,’ I say.

‘It’s you,’ he says.

He hands me the vial, and I try my best to keep my hands steady as I take it from him. ‘Have you taken this?’

‘Once,’ he says softly. ‘I missed you.’

He takes the vial from me, looking at it with a mesmerised expression.

‘You taste, surprisingly sweet,’ he says. ‘But it’s layered. There’s another flavour beneath. A dark, smoky sort of thing.’

He closes his palm around it and looks up at me, locking me in his gaze.

‘Twinks,’ he says. ‘No Muggles. I Obliviate them when we’re done.’

‘You hired Knocturn Alley whores to use my body and fuck you.’

‘Yes.’

I can feel my magic rising up around me, and from the way he shrinks away from me, I know he can feel it, too.

‘When?’ I ask. ‘How many times?’

‘Twice,’ he says quickly. ‘Once when you asked me to stop seeing you. The other, when you started seeing him.’

‘So, you were fucking me over either way.’

He closes his eyes briefly. ‘Yes.’

I feel a small, sharp pain in my chest, like the tip of a knife pressing down into the space between my ribs. I remind myself that I wanted to know. I wanted everything.

I’d never once considered that learning everything there is to know about Harry could also end up costing me everything. That it was possible that the things he’d done were unforgivable.

He looks at me as if expecting a blow.

It’s only then I notice that my palms are clenched and my nails are digging painfully into my skin. I unclench my fists and stare at the pale half moons indented into my palms.

‘Is there more?’ I ask.

He swallows. ‘Yes.’

‘Worse than this?’

‘Possibly. I’m not sure.’

‘Tell me.’

He shifts closer to me. ‘Before I do,’ he says. ‘I need to tell you something.’

I can’t think of anything to say to this, so I don’t.

He licks his lips nervously. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘For what I did. It was despicable. I was despicable.’

I take a deep shuddering breath. ‘You were.’

‘I never wanted to hurt you, and I did it again and again. In the worst possible ways.’

‘Well,’ I say. ‘I certainly know why you didn’t want to tell me.’

‘I’m sorry, Draco.’

‘You’ve said.’

He sighs and leans his back against the arm of the sofa, putting a lot more space between us than before. ‘Should I just go?’ he asks. ‘Is that what you want?’

I have to physically hold myself back from cursing him. As it is, my palm twitches as if to grab my wand and I stop myself by digging my fingers into my thighs. An action which, Auror as he is, I’m sure is not lost on him.

‘Harry,’ I say slowly, ‘if you leave this room right now, I guarantee you’ll never see me again.’

His shoulders relax minutely and he starts tapping his foot in that annoying way he has when he’s nervous.

‘Stop it.’

He stops. Then he starts again.

‘I don’t know what to do here, Draco,’ he says. ‘I don’t know how to make this better.’

‘Neither do I.’

‘Draco, I—if that happened; I know I wouldn’t survive it.’

‘If what happened?’

‘If I never saw you again.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘Because, I’ve tried it before, and it didn’t go so well.’

I give him a hard look. ‘And what about Polyjuice?’

He squeezes his palm and I hear the vial snap and break in his fist. A trickle of blood mixed with Polyjuice Potion slowly snakes its way through his fingers and down to his wrists.

‘Fuck, Harry!’

‘It’s gone,’ he says. ‘That was my last stash.’

I Scourgify the mess and take his palm into my hands. There’s a shard of glass wedged deeply into his lifeline. He doesn’t seem to feel it. I grab my wand from between the sofa cushions and spell it out of his hand. I have nothing else, so I Transfigure the glass into a small cloth that I press against the wound, and I wrap it into a knot across the back of his hand. He takes no notice of any of this, but instead he gazes at me as if seeing me for the first time.

‘You idiot,’ I say. ‘Do you realise how dangerous it is to mix blood with Poly―’

He shuts me up with the press of his lips against mine. When he pulls away, he grasps my face in his palms and gently rests his forehead against mine.

‘I love you, Draco,’ he says softly.

My heart starts thudding against my chest. ‘Harry,’ I say softly.

He lifts his head from mine and looks me in the eye, our faces so close I can feel his breath against my lips.

‘Even if you left me now,’ he says. ‘Even if you can’t forgive me, and you move on, and you stay with him, I’ll still love you.’

He drops his palms into his lap, fiddling with his fingers in a way I’ve never seen him do before. As if he’s fifteen again and not twenty-eight.

‘It would kill me to see you with him,’ he says. ‘But I’d do it. Just to be near you sometimes. Just to have my fill of you. Because I love you, and I’m sorry I’m so fucked up that I couldn’t see it for so long. And I couldn’t say it even though it was ringing in my ears.’

He looks up at me. ‘I love you, Draco. I always have.’

I kiss him hard on the mouth because Merlin knows I’ve wanted, needed to to hear this for the last three years. And the simple fact is I love him back, no matter what he’s done. I love him so much it’ll probably kill us both, and I won’t give him up, no matter what else he has in that stupid, sodding bag of his.

I’m an idiot, I know this. A complete and utter fool.

And I can’t let him go. I don’t even want to try.

I pull away from him and take his palm. The cloth is soaked in his blood.

‘Let me heal this,’ I say.

He looks solemnly at me as I take my wand and murmur the incantation to seal his skin. I know the spell is familiar to him; it’s the one Severus taught me after that day in the bathroom. We almost killed each other that day.

When I’m finished he says, ‘I’m sorry.’

I sigh; I don’t know if he’s apologising for what he did or for what he’s just told me. I’m not sure if he knows either. ‘I know you are, Harry.’

He runs his finger across his palm. ‘You’ve given me a new life line,’ he says.

I look at his palm. ‘So I have.’

He smiles briefly and then his faces changes, as if he suddenly remembers what it is we’re talking about.

‘Do you still want to know everything?’ he asks, licking his lips nervously. ‘I mean, we don’t have to do everything now, do we?’

I look at him, and I know he’s not just saying that to get out of this. I know that he’s still terribly afraid that I’m going to leave him because of what he hasn’t told me. I don’t know how to tell him that it’s an impossibility. That I’m bound to him and that he’s bound to me. And that telling me could only make us closer.

I don’t know how to say any of this, so instead I only tell him, ‘I need to know.’

He lets out a long sigh, and, after eyeing me warily, he holds out his forearm and pulls up the sleeve of his shirt.

I look at his arm, pale with a sprinkling of coarse, dark hair that lies surprisingly flat considering the rebellious strands that sit on his head. I can’t see anything out of the ordinary, I look at him in confusion, and he locks his eyes with mine, whispering a spell under his breath.

At first, they’re slow to appear - two or three circular rings of scarred flesh. Then, four more. And more, until about a dozen of the same burned circles of flesh appear in the inside of his forearm. Some are recent. Very recent. But most are old and faded. A few have almost completely disappeared from sight.

I grab his arm, turning it over, looking for more.

When I look at him, he licks his lips nervously, flexing his fingers in my lap as if to grasp his wand.

‘Cigarette burns,’ he says softly.

‘Cigarette burns,’ I echo stupidly.

I stare at his arms as my brain whirls in confused circles and I’m trying to latch onto one thing at a time. This is Harry’s arm. Covered with scars. Not just scars; cigarette burns. He smokes cigarettes; I’ve seen him do it many times. I hate the vile things. He’s killing himself, I’m sure of it. He’s—

‘I don’t always do it,’ he says quickly. ‘I hadn’t for a long time.’

‘Do it,’ I say.

‘Yes.’

‘Burn yourself.’ I say.

He just looks at me.

‘You did this?’

He nods.

‘You, yourself.’

‘Yes.’

I look at his arm and then into his eyes. Those ridiculous eyes behind those ridiculous, square glasses, which, really, he shouldn’t be wearing, because honestly, a man like him should be able to find a decent healer skilled enough to repair his ridiculous eyesight. The whole thing is utterly ridiculous. Why would he? He’s not like that.

‘Why?’ I ask.

He folds his arms across his chest and looks away from me, and I know immediately it’s the wrong question to ask.

He sighs. ‘It looks a lot worse than it is,’ he says.

I can’t for the life of me figure out what the hell he’s talking about. He’s deliberately harming himself. What could be worse?

‘Harry, I don’t—’ I shake my head, unable to finish the sentence.

‘Understand? Don’t you get it, Draco?’

He repeats the incantation, and the scars are gone once again. I spare a moment to consider the amount of magical energy he uses each day to keep his secret. It must be exhausting.

‘Why, Harry?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You must know.’

‘I― It makes me feel better.’

‘How?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Harry, I―’ my voice dies in my throat, because honestly I don’t know what to say.

‘I know,’ he says. ‘I know it’s too much.’He pulls his sleeves down again and reaches for his jacket. ‘It’s too much. I knew it would be too much.’

‘Harry, stop.’

He hastily looks through his jacket pocket for his wand, to Disapparate I’m sure, but I grab on to his arm and pull him close to me instead. He resists, but only for a moment, and then he settles limply into my arms.

‘It’s too much,’ he says into my neck.

‘It’s not too much,’ I say. ‘I’m still here.’

He holds on to my shoulders.

‘I’m still here,’ I say again.

He pulls away from me and runs his hands through his hair. ‘You probably think I’m crazy,’ he says.

‘I don’t.’

‘You wouldn’t be the first.’

I hesitate. ‘Does Weasley know?’

He looks at me incredulously. ‘Are you completely mental? He would have chucked me into St. Mungo’s ages ago.’

‘He wouldn’t have.’

He shakes his head. ‘I’m an Auror, Draco,’ he says. ‘He would have had to report me.’

He chews on a hangnail, and I grab his hand before he draws blood again.

He looks at me hesitantly. ‘Will you?’

‘You know I won’t,’ I say. ‘But I think you should at least consider talking to someone.’

He gives me a look, pulling his hand away from me. ‘Talking to someone,’ he echoes quietly.

I sigh. ‘Harry—I can’t do it all. You need someone who knows what they’re doing, someone who knows how to help you.’

‘I knew it,’ he says. ‘I knew you couldn’t handle it.’

‘I can handle it, Harry. But I want you to get better.’

‘Get better? There’s nothing wrong with me! I...it’s the way I deal with things. I know it’s not the way you deal with things...or Ron...or Hermione...or Justin. But it helps me, okay? It helps me to keep moving.’

‘Harry, it doesn’t help you. It’s self destructive.’

He lets out a brief, hollow laugh, scooting further away from me and fiddling unnecessarily with the cuff of his shirt. ‘You’re so small minded,’ he says.

‘It’s common sense! Harry, people don’t hurt themselves on purpose. It’s—’

‘It’s mental?’

‘That’s not what I was going to say.’

‘I know it’s fucked up,’ he says. ‘Why do you think I didn’t want to tell you? But it’s not mental. It’s just a way that I deal with things.’

‘Harry, you’re not dealing with anything. You’re burning holes into your skin!’

He gives me a long, hard look and then he sighs. ‘I knew it was a mistake telling you,’ he says, his voice hollow.

‘Harry, I can’t just watch you do this to yourself. And you knew that. That’s why you wouldn’t tell me. You knew I couldn’t let you do it.’

He scoffs. ‘Let me? I didn’t tell you because I knew it would freak you out. But I can’t stop.’ He looks at me for a moment. ‘You can’t ask me to stop.’

‘Harry―’

‘No, Draco,’ he says. His chest heaves and I can almost feel his panic rising. ‘You have to leave me this. You can’t just take it all away. You have to leave me this one thing. I...I need it.’

I look at him for a long moment. I don’t know what to do with this, or where to go from here. I can’t make him stop, but I can’t continue our― whatever it is we’re doing - knowing that he does this to himself. It’ll always be on my mind, haunting me. If we have a fight. If he’s had a bad day....

A dark thought suddenly occurs to me. ‘Harry,’ I say. ‘Today, in the bathroom, did you...did you hurt yourself?’

He doesn’t need to say yes. The expression on his face tells me all I need to know.

He sighs and nods, looking dismayed. When I don’t say anything further, I feel the couch shift as he stands in front of me and pulls on his jacket.

‘I’ll uh, I’ll give you some time,’ he says in a hollow voice. ‘To think about things.’

I nod woodenly, but I find that I can’t quite look at him.

He looks at me for a long moment, touches my face with his fingertips, and sighs. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says softly. And then after a moment’s hesitation, ‘I love you.’

I don’t even flinch when he Disapparates.


	14. Chapter 14

**A/N:  
Dear Readers, **

**After struggling with this fic for many months, I am, unfortunately, throwing in the towel. I hate to do this, and I’m really quite sorry, but this fic will never be completed. This was my first WIP and I was quite ambitious with it. I swore I wasn't going to be one of those people who can’t finish, but the truth is, I’ve lost interest in this fic, and because of that I can’t see a resolution.**

**[But, In Dreams](http://archiveofourown.org/works/846553) is what this fic would have been if I had written it better. It has many of the same themes, and I hope you give it a read, even though I’ve disappointed you with this one. **

**I’m never endeavouring on a WIP again. All my works, ficlets and long stories will be completed before posting from now on, so I can actually promise that this will not happen again.**

**If you have,  
thanks for sticking with me this long.   
I’m still writing  
Love,   
Nox**

****


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